House of Reeds

Aboard the Cornuelle In the Upper Troposphere Above Continent Three

A familiar vibration against his back roused Hadeishi from a drugged, placid daze. He woke with his heart racing, overcome by a feeling of near-panic. There were voices on the air, but more immediate was an overriding urgency… The ship is waking, Mitsuharu, you must be at your station!

The metallic smell of urine and blood filled his nostrils. Hadeishi opened his eyes, took in a ceiling with two dead lighting panels and a dull emergency light and turned his head carefully to the side. The Chu-sa had woken up in Medical more than once and experience reminded him to move with deliberation. A handful of medical staff, haloed by portable lamps, tended an inordinate number of patients. The bay itself was in zero-g, which was one more sign of severe damage, and sticky webs of damage control spray kept loose garbage, debris and the wounded from drifting.

Hadeishi craned his neck, looking down his arm. His usual medband was gone, replaced by a cufflike unit attached to the medical bed. An amber indicator showed the medibot was running on battery power. I'm still in my suit – odd – ah, now I remember. The ship is damaged. I am damaged.

Everything popped back into focus. Hadeishi cleared his throat experimentally and found he could still move his tongue. And speak, I hope.

He clicked his teeth and felt the comm thread and earbug come alive against his cheek.

"Hadeishi to Engineering. Status?"

That was quick, Isoroku responded after a moment's delay. The engineer's voice was overlaid with a buzz of static. The Chu-sa heard the throttled growl of the main power plant and its attendant transformers, heat-exchangers and transmission apparatus in the background. The gui-ni said you'd be out for hours while you healed…

"The ship woke up," Hadeishi said, still feeling rather distant from the dark, suffocating room and his numbed body. "And so did I. Main power is on-line?"

Hai. Bottle's up, control systems are clean. We're about to start bringing up navigational control and the reaction drives. Should be able to make orbital correction in about…forty minutes.

"Do we have communications outside the ship?"

To the surface, you mean? Isoroku's voice faded with exhaustion, and then strengthened again. We had a tightbeam link to the Legation about an hour ago…but the Residency came under attack and the comm dropped out. I think Helsdon is dead.

"What about traffic control?"

Up here? Chu-sa , there's no one to talk to! Only derelicts…

Hadeishi convulsed with a wheezing hack. The table beeped angrily at him and sleepyhead began to leak into his blood. The Chu-sa felt a familiar numbness in his extremities and began breathing through his nose, slowing his heart. Sometimes the medical bay bedsensors had to be treated delicately if a man was to get his work done.

"Thai-i, the ship will be a danger to navigation – including our own shuttles – as long as the point defense systems have node power. So as you restore grid by grid, make sure none of the gatling or railgun mounts come back on-line. Route your damage control teams to disable them as soon as possible."

Hai, kyo!

"What is this?"

The gui-ni in charge of the bay suddenly appeared over Hadeishi, a reproving scowl on his dark brown face. "Awake despite the drugs, I see." The Mixtec leaned close, one hand on the bed-rail, and produced a sensor wand, watching the readout from the heavy-duty medband. "Chu-sa Hadeishi, your rib-cage is badly bruised, your lungs are half shriveled from lack of oxygen and low suit pressure, your leg muscles are badly strained and you've suffered a heavy dose of radiation poisoning."

He passed the wand over the Chu-sa's forehead. "Why don't you let yourself heal? In sixteen or seventeen hours, the worst of the damage will be repaired…"

Hadeishi moved his head aside. "There are crewmen who need your assistance, isha. My condition is sufficient for duty. I am needed on the bridge before more of my men are injured or killed."

The gui-ni regarded him levelly for a moment. "Both medical bays are full. I've men in trauma bags hanging in the hallway like cuts of meat and there are whole compartments from bulkhead sixteen back the damage control teams haven't managed to cut into yet. I need this medical bed, but you're the captain and that means you get priority treatment -"

"I disagree." Hadeishi pointed his chin at the restraints across his chest. "Release me and you'll have the bed back."

"Your condition -"

"Isha, I'm giving you an order," Hadeishi said, forcing his tongue to move. "I'll sit very still once I'm on the bridge."

The Mixtec grunted noncommittally. His face was dotted with tiny green flecks of drying woundgel. "Fleet executive authority does not extend to the medical branch, save in an advisory role, Chu-sa. You can't order me to do anything."

Hadeishi suppressed a ghoulish laugh. "Nor can you restrict my authority, save by rendering me unconscious. This argument is pointless – here, I do nothing but take up space and your time. On the bridge, I can improve matters for all of us."

"Perhaps." The Mixtec sighed and made a hand motion indicating the acceptance of fate.

The gui-ni called for one of his corpsmen and keyed the bed to detach itself from the captain. "The primary bridge is either destroyed or unreachable," the Mixtec said conversationally. "Hayes and Jaguar were processed through here about six hours ago. Command and control has shifted to the secondary. I believe Smith-tzin is now acting duty officer."

A corpsman kicked over and took hold of the railing on the edge of the bed. "Kyo?"

"The Chu-sa needs to get to secondary control. Make sure he doesn't overexert himself while you're moving him." The doctor nodded to Hadeishi. "This man will take you there."

The Chu-sa nodded, still very weak and was happy to lie still, head back, while they detached the various tubes and sensors connecting him to the medical bed. He tried to muster the strength to ask if senior lieutenant Patrick Hayes and ensign Three-Jaguar had been 'processed' alive, dead, or crippled, but failed. The effort of holding back tears, of showing the dignity proper to a Fleet officer, was enough to exhaust the tiny store of energy left to him.

So many ghosts cling to your soul, the air whispered. Like the ship herself, only a tattered hull, filled with indistinct voices. Do you hear them calling your name?

Hadeishi curled his arm around the corpsman's shoulders and let himself be removed from the bed.